ease and console the mind to offer a few reflections on Paradise Regained.
O what a blessed promise is contained in the sentence here extracted! These words were by Jehovah addressed to the serpent: it is the first promise contained in the Holy Word of the coming of the Lord Jesus in the flesh, as the true Messiah, to destroy the works of the wicked one—the great dragon, that old serpent, the devil, and satan, which deceiveth the whole world. (Rev. xii. 9.) The craft, treachery, and subtlety of serpents are qualities insisted on in Scripture, distinguishing them from all other animals, and hence the serpent is said to be more subtle than any beast of the field. The most ancient people were accustomed to consider the serpent as the true and proper emblem of the sensual mind and life of man, by which he was every moment, through treachery and deceit, liable to be deceived and turned aside from all that is good and true—from all wisdom and righteousness of life. The serpent is hence named in Scripture to imply that which deceives with malice, treachery, and falsehood; and is put to signify all evil and falsehood in the complex. Man loses his honour and glory when he inclines to evil and loves it. Whenever he was deceived it was always by a lie, and if ever he is to be undeceived, it must be by the Truth. All falsehood, deceit, and treachery, originating in evil, is in Scripture called the poison of serpents and the cruel venom of asps. Thus evil men are said to imagine mischief and to sharpen their tongues like a serpent, while adders' poison is described as being under their lips. (Psalm cxl. 3.) The head of the serpent is the dominion of evil, including within it, like poison in the serpent's
